


The Hounds

by MirrorMystic



Category: Original Work
Genre: Action, Demon Hunters, Freeform, Gen, High Fantasy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2018-01-05
Packaged: 2019-02-17 10:38:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13075116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MirrorMystic/pseuds/MirrorMystic
Summary: When the Church makes war, they send the Knights.When the Church makes peace, they send the Mission.But when the Church makes a mess…...they send in The Hounds.





	1. Crimson and Gold

**Author's Note:**

> A story of girl-meets-girl, in a world of magic, monsters, slayers, and secrets.

~*~  
  
_Suffer not the witch to live._  
  
In the Halidom of Zion, that decree holds sway. Every law-abiding citizen, every member of the faithful- and indeed, within Zion’s borders the two are one and the same- holds that decree close to their hearts. Every child hears stories of the dangers of a witch-mind- and of the catastrophic power they can unleash.  
  
Suffer not the witch to live. But the death of a witch does not come easily.  
  
If you want to kill a witch, bring an army.  
  
Watch Captain Garrett Wilder did not bring an army. He brought a mob of volunteer militia, brandishing whatever weapons they had close at hand- daggers, clubs, wood axes, shortbows.  
  
The hunting party tracked the witch to a cottage on the edge of town. It was abandoned and in disrepair, the roof half-fallen in, the yard overgrown. A single candleflame, and a silhouette in the window, were all the sign of their target that they needed.  
  
The hunting party lurked in the treeline, squinting down at the lone cottage beneath a melancholy moon. Captain Wilder glanced at the volunteers beside him- edgy, strung-out with nerves, holding their bows too tight.  
  
The poor fools have probably never shot anything bigger than a rabbit before. It’d be different, shooting a person.  
  
Wilder shook his head. People were people, and a witch was a witch. And the sooner they got this over with, the sooner they’d all get paid.  
  
Wilder nocked an arrow and drew it back until his knuckles grazed his chin.  
  
The candle flickered. The shadow in the window bent its arms, as if in prayer.  
  
Wilder took his shot. Half a second later, the other archers followed his lead.  
  
The cottage was old. Its roof was brittle, dry straw. And when two dozen flaming arrows plunged down from above, the whole thing went up in a whoosh of roaring flames.  
  
Wilder laughed and waved the men forward. The fire would smoke the witch out of hiding. She would emerge only to find herself surrounded by blades- and they’d chop her to pieces, like so much firewood.  
  
His men charged, their weapons flashing in the firelight.  
  
Then the cottage exploded.  
  
The charge recoiled as if slapped. Men fell, clutching bloody, burning wounds- impaled by flaming debris as surely as thrown knives. Fire rained from the sky and exploded at the mens’ feet, hurling hunters into the air and setting them ablaze.  
  
Wilder gazed, unblinking, into the firelight, stunned beyond words.  
  
The fire… it moved as if… alive.  
  
Not alive. _Possessed_.  
  
Wilder grit his teeth. His gaze settled on the shadow in the distance, walking, untouched, through the flames. He caught a flash of amber eyes, and flaxen hair blazing like a crown.  
  
Wilder took his shot. His arrow flew, straight and true. Perfect.  
  
The girl slapped the arrow out of the air with a curl of flame. Her eyes flashed crimson.  
  
The fire rose up into a colossal burning pillar, a tree of flame rooted within the abandoned cottage. The witch threw her hands forward, and the pillar upended itself, slamming down into the treeline. The tremendous explosion hurled Wilder off of his feet, obliterated the grass into a cloud of ash and dust, and set the woods ablaze.  
  
Wilder rose to one knee, eyes watering, choking on smoke. The hunting party was defeated- shattered, with contemptuous ease. But he could still see someone through the smoke…  
  
A flash of white. A glint of gold.  
  
The Church. The Church was here…  
  
“Father!” Wilder cried out, his voice all but lost to the roaring flames. “Father, help me!”  
  
A figure emerged, garbed in white, a brass staff in their slender, sun-kissed hands. A boy, scarcely a man, yet still bore the marks of the church- a stylized letter “T”, crowned with a flame. The Order of the Torch.  
  
The boy gazed down at Wilder, his eyes distant, inscrutable.  
  
“Help me, ser,” Wilder pleaded. He nodded weakly to the roiling blaze. “...She is a witch.”  
  
“You will receive all the help you deserve,” the boy said, and turned away.  
  
Wilder stared at the boy’s back, stunned.  
  
“What- What are you doing?! Help me! S-Stop her! She is a witch!”  
  
“And you are a traitor, to this nation and this church,” the boy said.  
  
He glanced over his shoulder, and met Wilder’s eyes.  
  
“May you bask in Her light,” the boy intoned, as he left the captain to burn.  
  
~*~  
  
She was waiting for him in the cottage, the eye of the storm. She was clutching her head, crimson and gold snaking around her form. She was shaking, sweat and tears mingling as they traced wet lines down soot-stained cheeks.  
  
She turned, and her eyes went wide.    
  
“Hamir!” She gasped, a gout of flame surging out of her fingertips.  
  
The priest raised a hand. The blast flashed against a pane of translucent, golden light, before dissipating to nothing. The witch backed away, shuddering, grabbing fistfuls of her own hair.  
  
“Get back,” she shuddered. Her eyes flickered between amber and crimson. “It’s not safe.”  
  
“Be calm,” the priest spoke, his words echoing strangely in the confined space. “It’s over.”  
  
The witch sank to her knees, flames flashing around her form. The priest knelt beside her, laying his staff on the ground between them. A screen of shimmering golden light appeared between them. She rode out the surge of power, magical fire flashing against the barrier but not passing through. Eventually, she heaved a sigh, and her crimson aura faded completely.  
  
The witch slicked a hand through her hair, fading from a shining, platinum-blonde back to its original black. When she finally looked up at her partner, her eyes were a steady amber. Her lips curled into a small, rueful smile.  
  
“...Can we go home now?” she asked.  
  
Beyond them, the fire blazing through the treeline faded into nothing, leaving only smoke, scorched earth, and charred bodies behind.  
  
The priest took up his staff and rose to his feet, offering the witch his hand. She took it, and he helped her to her feet. For a moment, his eyes lingered on her stigma- the mark of a stylized “S”, branded into the back of her hand. He looked from her brand, to her eyes, to the carnage outside, haloed in the moonlight. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and sighed.  
  
“The Goddess is the light of the World,” he began.  
  
“And we are Her torches,” she finished. “Some of us, more than others.”  
  
They vanished into the night- the witch hooded in crimson, the priest robed in white, leaving the bodies of cutthroats and bounty hunters smouldering in their wake.  
  
There is a decree, in the land of Zion, set forth by the Holy Order of the Torch:  
  
Suffer not the witch to live.  
  
Unless, of course, they can be put to use…  
  
~*~


	2. Solace

~*~  
  
_~*_ **_Hamir_ ** _*~_ _  
_   
There are no men permitted within the Order of the Torch.   
  
Certain exceptions are made, of course. Formal envoys, for example. Apothecaries. Traders, when they prove too eager to wait for the one day a week the Sisters can venture into town, and their vibrant stalls and banners liven up our drab, stone courtyard. The stray cat who wanders the grounds, whom Canoness Curie once dubbed Ser Felix, Knight of the Order, and none present could discern whether she was joking.   
  
I, too, am an exception to this rule. My name is Hamir Abbas. I am an Exorcist in service to the Order. I am confessor, faith healer, demon hunter.   
  
I am one of the few men permitted within the otherwise all-female Order compound.   
  
Disgrace, it seems, is open to all genders.   
  
I walk, ghostlike, through the compound, a shadow through the fog, in the muffled stillness of falling snow. No heads turn to mark my passing- not those of the Knights, in their midnight blue cloaks and tabards; not the column of two dozen novices in gray, scurrying off to their morning classes; nor the Sister who leads them, robed and veiled in pure white.   
  
I, too, wear the white of the clergy, and the crest of the Order gleams golden on my breast. A red cloth, tied around my staff, flutters like a pennant in the snowy breeze.   
  
The people I pass in the street do not meet my eyes. They see the flash of red, and they turn away.   
  
But there are exceptions to this, as well. Across the courtyard, I see a girl, or rather, I see a shock of red hair all-but swallowed up by a hooded hunting cloak. She catches my eyes and jumps, waving. I smile, and give Piper a polite nod. She has a brace of rabbits slung over her shoulders. On her way to the cookhouse, most likely.   
  
A squad of Knights shoulders past me on the way to the stables. None of them meet my gaze, save for the woman walking primly at their heels. She looks like a vision of the night sky, her armor gleaming silver beneath a midnight-blue surcoat and dark, fur-trimmed cloak. The wolfskin around her shoulders frames the sculptural arch of her head, and her hair, so fair it’s practically white, glimmers in the light like a crown.   
  
In sharp contrast to Piper’s boundless enthusiasm, Captain Freya only nods in my direction. She meets my gaze for a moment with her ice-blue eyes, and inclines her head- a fraction of an inch. A little thing, really. But it’s more than enough.   
  
It’s a warm thing, seeing a friendly face in a crowd of averted eyes. It’s almost warm enough to make me forget about the snow- almost.   
  
I hug my arm closer to my chest and heave a sigh, my breath misting in the air. The hem of my robes traces the cobblestones, sending little flurries of snow dusting up with every step.   
  
I’ve arrived. I place a hand on the wooden doors, twice the height of a man, and gently ease them open.   
  
I am greeted by a vast atrium, a staircase snaking its way up along the walls. Banners in midnight blue hang from every windowsill, a deep blue field marked by the Order crest in gold. The centerpiece of the tower is a massive stone carving of a woman, her hands clasped and head bowed in prayer, crowned in fire by the beacon at the tower’s peak. The pale gray stone around me flickers gold, cast in the firelight of the beacon above.   
  
The Goddess smiles upon me.   
  
I approach the shrine, my staff echoing as it taps against the floor. Kneeling at the base of the statue are a dozen novices at daily devotion. One gray-robed novice casts a curious eye towards me, but a Sister in white touches her arm and ushers her aside.   
  
The base of the altar is surrounded by a ring of candles. I take a taper from a box of sand and light it from one candle, before turning and lighting a candle of my own.   
  
“ _Ave illuminae_ ,” I murmur. I extinguish the taper in its box of sand, and watch the wisp of smoke drift up to the beacon above. All around me, the air hums with voices at prayer.   
  
“My Lady, you are the light of the world, and I am your torch,” I intone, clutching my staff to my chest. “Through me, may you bring warmth to the needy, fire to the wicked, and light to the lost.”   
  
I lift my face towards the fire. From my place at her feet, the beacon at the top of the tower shines like a halo around her head.   
  
“In your name, I serve,” I whisper. “And in your hands, I burn.”   
  
The beacon fills the tower with a radiant firelight, but the Goddess remains cold. I meet her shadowed, stony gaze, silent, inscrutable.   
  
I breathe out a sigh, basking in Her light.   
  
“ _Ave illuminae_ ,” I murmur. I turn around and venture back out into the snow.   
  
~*~   
  
~* **_Sola_ ** *~   
  
They call it ‘The Lighthouse’.   
  
It is, indeed, an actual lighthouse- our compound is perched on a cliff overlooking Halcyon Bay, and you can imagine the embarrassment if the Order allowed wayward sailors to smash against the base of our plateau.   
  
But it is so much more than that. It is our central shrine, the great spire at the center of the compound. It is our holy pillar, our beacon against the darkness. The fire that burns atop that tower has burned since the day the World began.   
  
Or so the legend says. I’m not sure how much I believe that.   
  
The Lighthouse is beautiful, no matter what the legends say. I see it, shining, through my window every day. Hamir says it’s a blessing that my room faces the beacon; that it means the Goddess is watching over me.   
  
I’m not sure how much I believe that, either.   
  
The corners of the Order compound are marked by towers. The Lighthouse is the central tower, the biggest and the brightest. On one side, there is the Garrison, where the Knights call home. On the other, there is the Aerie, home to diplomats, missionaries, and a veritable flock of messenger birds.   
  
And, lastly, there’s my tower- the Reclusiam. The smallest, and furthest from the Lighthouse’s holy beacon- home to the Order’s dusty old relics, shelves full of outdated tomes-   
  
And their secrets. Like me.   
  
My name is Sola.   
  
From my window, I watch the world spin on. I watch Knights standing watch, lingering by lit braziers and trying to rub some life into their numbing hands. I watch Sisters leading rows of novices to their classes, white veils leading swarms of gray robes. I watch the snow drifting lazily through the pale gray sky. I watch Halcyon City far below, houses lit with firelight, smoke rising from chimneys.     
  
I watch. I wait. I wonder.   
  
Snow is drifting just past my window. I reach out on a whim, cupping my hand to catch some- but my hand stops short, tapping against a pane of golden light.   
  
I press my hand flat against the light and push. The barrier molds itself against my fingers, thick and viscous, like wading through mud. The glyphs inscribed on my windowsill shine white, as if in warning.   
  
I sigh, and pull my hand away. The barrier shimmers, and fades from view.   
  
I hear the familiar sound of Hamir’s staff thumping up the steps, and I hear the metal creaking of the bolts being slid back.   
  
The door swings open. The guard steps aside to let Hamir in, before the pulling the door shut behind him.   
  
“ _Ave illuminae_ ,” he says, in greeting.   
  
“ _Ave illuminae_ ,” I echo.   
  
“Are you cold?” he asks, nodding towards my window. “I can close the shutters.”   
  
“No,” I say, managing a smile. “I’m alright.”   
  
Hamir raises an eyebrow at the glyphs on the windowsill, but says nothing. I pull a chair out for him at my little table in the corner, and I take the opposite seat. He pulls a cloth bundle from his shoulder and unfurls it, revealing grapes, cheese, and a loaf of coarse, brown bread.   
  
“I tried to get you some rabbit stew,” he says, “but I’m afraid it wasn’t quite ready yet.”   
  
“Pity,” I say, and smile.   
  
We eat together in a warm quiet, moving together with the comfort and ease of a pair who’d lived together for years. I can tell, right away, that Hamir is distracted. He never eats as much as I do- for whatever reason, the use of my powers always gives me such an appetite- but today, he barely picks at his food. He keeps looking out my window, or looking at me, whenever he thinks I don’t see him peeking.   
  
“What’s wrong?” I ask, knowingly.   
  
Hamir blinks at me.   
  
“What? Nothing.”   
  
I spread a curl of soft cheese onto a hunk of bread and press a grape into it, before popping the whole thing into my mouth. I chew thoughtfully, swallow, and then shoot Hamir a dubious look, leaning my chin on my hand.   
  
Hamir sighs. He glances at my window again.   
  
“Have you ever thought about leaving here, Sola?”   
  
“No,” I say, too quickly.   
  
Now it’s Hamir’s turn to look dubious.   
  
“Of course I have,” I clarify. “But where would I go?”   
  
Hamir sighs again, looking away. I offer him my hand, and he takes it, idly tracing the brand behind my knuckles.   
  
“...It isn’t right,” he murmurs. “It isn’t right, the Order keeping you here.”   
  
“Careful,” I warn. “That’s the kind of talk that can get you censured.”   
  
“I’ve already been censured,” Hamir nods to the red pennant on his staff. “And even then, I can still freely walk the grounds. Because I am a priest, and I wield the light, these privileges are afforded me. But if I’d been born with command over, say, wind, or water, then I would be a witch, same as you.”   
  
Hamir shakes his head. I squeeze his hand.   
  
“I am alive,” I say. “Same as you.”   
  
“But I can leave,” Hamir insists. “I have that choice. That privilege. If I wanted to, I could leave the compound, leave this life… I could leave everything, everyone, behind.”   
  
I smile, knowingly.   
  
“No, you couldn’t.”   
  
Hamir meets my eyes, and gives my hand a squeeze.   
  
“...No,” he admits. “I couldn’t, could I?”   
  
The moment unspools between us, an island of warmth and light among the falling snow. In my time here at the Reclusiam, Hamir has been my lifeline- my link to the world beyond my window. Here in this tower, the walls inscribed with shining glyphs and marks of protection, I am safe from the world- and the world is safe from me.   
  
There’s a sharp, crashing bang, like thunder directly overhead. A tremor shivers through the tower, and I cry out, the moment shattering.   
  
Hamir is on his feet, his gaze once again drawn to my window.   
  
In the distance, far beyond Halcyon City, the woods are ablaze. A pall of thick, black smoke gathers above eerie, unnatural violet flames.   
  
I get to my feet and press myself against my window, catching myself on the translucent barrier, eye straining to see the distant commotion. Voices are rising from the compound beneath us. Orders, shouts, and cries of alarm swell up from the courtyard below.   
  
“What _was_ that?” I wonder aloud, dazed.   
  
Hamir swallows hard. He picks up his staff.   
  
“...I’ll find out,” he says. “Stay here.”   
  
“But-”   
  
“Stay _here_ .”   
  
He gives my hand another squeeze, and then he’s out the door, leaving me to watch, wait, and wonder from behind the bars of my gilded cage.   
  
~*~


	3. Through the Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fire to the wicked; light to the lost. / _(This is not the work of heroes.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If your hometown doesn't get destroyed by demons, can you _really_ call it a meet cute?

~*~   
  
Rumor says that the Feywood is haunted.    
  
It was an embarrassment to the Order, Mother always told her. To have a so-called ‘cursed forest’ right on the doorstep of Halcyon City, a seat of the Order. Rumor said that there were  _ things _ in the forest- what Mother called ‘spirits’, and what the Order called ‘daemons’- things that lived in the water, in the earth, things that made the trees grow tall and filled the undergrowth with magic.    
  
Mother always said that was stuffy mysticism talking. But now, as she walks the snow-lined path, clutching Mother’s guidebook to her chest, she can certainly see the appeal.    
  
The Feywood is beautiful. Entrancing, even. With its dark, skeletal trees dusted with snow and glimmering in the dim light, it’s little wonder the forest is the stuff of fairy-tales.    
  
In the stillness, she breathes deep of the crisp, winter air. She kneels, her dark robe spilling like ink across the snow. She pulls off one of her mittens, and leafs through the pages of Mother’s guidebook, humming.    
  
Ah, yes. White flowerbuds, clusters of three, star-shaped leaves.    
  
She snaps the guidebook shut and slips it into the pouch slung over her shoulder. She reaches forward, dusts snow off the specimen, then cuts herself a sample with the dagger at her belt.    
  
She continues along the trail, taking cuttings of herbs, tree bark, berries, each sample vanishing into one of the myriad vials and pouches strewn across her form.    
  
Tonics, salves, poultices, potions- Mother taught her how to make them, and Mother taught her what went into them, turning her morning walk into a chance to top off her stock. This was the true bounty of the Feywood. Not magic, not monsters, but medicine.   
  
She crests the hill back into town, easing the weight of her pack on her shoulders, when something catches her eye.    
  
There is a mark, floating in the air. A glyph, an arcane symbol, drifting above the village like a cloud, shining like a star with an eerie violet light.    
  
She pauses at the top of the hill, gazing in wonder at the unearthly light. Her friends and neighbors stop, at their doors, their windows, in their fields. All of them stop in their tracks to behold the omen above their village, murmuring, wondering.    
  
The glyph flickers and sizzles, like a burn spreading across parchment.    
  
Then-   
  
Light. Thunder. She hits the ground and rolls, ears ringing, blinking colored spots from her eyes. She sits up, feels Mother’s guidebook pressing into her thigh, feels wetness on her fingertips and broken glass on her robe.    
  
She staggers to her feet, her legs shaking, dusting off the remnants of shattered vials with a mittened hand.    
  
It takes a long moment for her vision and hearing to return, after the explosion has robbed her senses. But what she sees- and what she hears- is like something out of a nightmare.    
  
There is a hole in the world where the glyph once hung- a ragged tear in the sky, oozing a wretched violet flame. Pillars of smoke fly out of the rift and become men when they hit the ground- shadows in the fire.    
  
She ducks as a plume of smoke rockets over her head and plunges into the snow behind her. A figure coalesces out of the smoke- a shadow in dark, rusting armor, with a skull-faced helm and violet fire in its eyes.    
  
He brandishes an axe, snarling with a voice like scraping metal.    
  
She doesn’t watch the blade come down. She’s already running.    
  
~*~   
  
Larksnettle is a backwater- a tiny forest hamlet living off the land, the river, and the wood. On any other day, the Church wouldn’t spare a little trappers’ village a second glance.    
  
Today is not any other day.    
  
Freya gazes out at the calamity before her. A rift, torn in the sky. A village, ablaze with violet light. A people, massacred senselessly and without warning, their bodies left to cool in the snow.    
  
Freya takes in the horrific sight with her steady, ice-blue eyes. She takes a deep breath, and sighs.    
  
When she turns to address her troops, her expression is resolute, ready to lead. They stand to attention with a clatter of shields and spears. Immediately, her officers are at her side.    
  
“Sister Ashe, the rift is yours,” Freya snaps. “Piper, get your rangers in the trees and circle the village. Not one of these abominations leaves these woods alive. Go.”   
  
“Gone,” Piper nods, and vanishes.    
  
Freya draws her sword and lifts it to the sky. A plume of fire shoots up from a burning brazier in the convoy and sets her blade alight.    
  
“Bask in Her light,” Freya intones, pacing the line of her troops. She touches her sword to her Knights’ raised spears, passing wisps of gold into the gleaming blades. “Burn in Her name.”   
  
Freya stops at the crest of the hill, gazing down at the blazing ruin of Larksnettle. Through the fire, shadows meet her gaze- a hundred flickering ghost lights in the visors of iron skulls.    
  
Freya has a more stirring speech planned, but the massacre below steals the words from her throat, leaving only bitterness behind. She grits her teeth, snarling out the order.    
  
“ _ Take them. _ ”   
  
Her Knights charge into the ruined village, their spears shining with the Goddess’ blessing. The sounds of battle are strangely one-sided- the Knights crying out in righteous fury, the Enemy eerily quiet, their voices like shadows and scraping metal.    
  
Freya stands, impassive, like a stone breaking the tide. She turns, her cloak billowing and dusting the snowy ground. Her eyes turn to her second, a Knight with a broad shoulders and skin like freshly-tilled soil. If Freya’s fair skin and platinum hair was a snowy peak, then Sergeant Bryn was the mountain beneath.    
  
“Set a guard around the beacon,” Freya orders. “Six women at all times.”   
  
“Yes, Captain.”   
  
Freya pauses. She sees the look Bryn gives her- curiosity, concern, even warmth. She exhales.    
  
This should have been glorious. A bit of action after too long sitting restless and idle, penned in by winter. A proper fight, against a worthy enemy. The work of heroes.    
  
But this isn’t war. This isn’t valiantly riding to a city’s rescue. This is a deathbed vigil. This is washing a corpse.   
  
This is not the work of heroes.    
  
“Sergeant,” Freya says, and Bryn snaps to attention.    
  
“Ser?”   
  
“Send in The Hounds.”   
  
~*~   
  
Hamir kneels at the foot of the beacon, gleaming in the firelight. On the wagon before him, there is a brazier, filled with a golden fire. It is a fragment of the beacon at the peak of the Lighthouse; it makes no smoke, and burns no fuel. While Hamir murmurs a prayer under his breath, a plume of fire rises from the brazier and flows into his staff. An orb of fire gathers within his staff’s forked headpiece. Golden light spirals down the gleaming brass and dances along his fingertips, his brass rings shining in the light.    
  
Hamir takes a deep breath, feeling the power thrumming in his grasp. He rises, and steps back out of the circle of Knights standing guard. Sola is waiting for him, barred from approaching the beacon.    
  
The Knights make a point of not looking either of them in the eye. But Sola can still feel the weight of their gaze upon them. She reaches out, instinctively, but stops herself from taking Hamir’s hand. Their pinkies touch, for a moment, and a wisp of golden fire flickers up her fingertips, highlighting the stylized ‘S’ of her Brand.    
  
The village of Larksnettle stretches out before them, a maelstrom of flashing blades and otherworldly violet fire. Knights advance, shoulder to shoulder, midnight blue cloaks and pennants flying in the breeze. A tide of ghost-eyed revenants smashes into the shield wall. The Knights stand firm, like a cliff against the sea.    
  
But Hamir’s staff, blazing like a torch, draws ghostly eyes to it like moths to a flame. Revenant soldiers chitter and screech, in their rasping, metallic voices. Dozens of violet eyes flash at the sight, turning their baleful attention away from the unyielding shield wall and towards softer, worthier prey.    
  
Shadows gather in the firelight. Sola watches as half a dozen revenants clutch their axes, take a running start, and  _ pounce _ -   
  
There is a squealing, like fingertips on wet glass, and then a series of sharp  _ bangs _ \- and half a dozen revenants are reduced to smoking, armored husks, obliterated on contact with Hamir’s barrier of solidified golden light.    
  
Revenants burst through the treeline. Hamir splays his fingers, brass rings gleaming, light gathering within his grasp. He blasts a charging revenant to ashes without even breaking stride, raising his hand and stopping an overhead axe swing with a disk of solidified light. The blade makes a sound like a tolling bell as it bounces off the barrier. Hamir shoves the revenant back a step and then angles the disk around with a deft gesture. The edge of the barrier shears the revenant’s head clean off.    
  
Hamir punches his fist forward. His conjured disk becomes a cone, and shoots forward, blasting out a revenant’s armored torso in a spatter of ink and gore. A trio of revenants comes running at them, head-on, up the trail. Hamir raises his staff, and a knee-high barrier of conjured light sends the daemon-knights toppling face-first into the snow. Hamir taps the base of his staff against the ground, and the hapless trio is unmade in a flash of light.    
  
“This is horrible,” Sola says, as they stride through the ruined village, Hamir and his barriers swatting stray revenants out of their path. She catches sight of a decidedly human body and cringes. “I hope someone was able to make it out alive.”   
  
Hamir nods, solemn. “Have faith,” he says.   
  
He’s certainly one to talk, as he wields the Goddess’ light to devastating effect. But he is only a conduit; a vessel to channel a power that isn’t his.    
  
The Goddess is the light of the world, and Hamir is Her torch.    
  
But Sola has a light all her own.    
  
Sola lifts her head and stares down the rift above Larksnettle town square, pulsing with otherworldly power. Its form flickers and shifts, like heat haze, showing glimpses of a distant nightmare. The rift shudders and vomits out a spear of black smoke- a column of darkness cut through with flashes of violet light, the glinting of dozens of inhuman eyes set in skull-faced helms.    
  
The pillar rises into the air and then dives, the smoke congealing into solid forms- rusting armor, brandished blades. Sola closes her amber eyes and takes a deep breath, the air hazing around her fingertips.    
  
Her eyes snap open, flashing crimson.    
  
Sola throws her hands forward and scarlet light erupts from her fingers, scorching the sky, painting the snowy ground a bloody red. Her burning pillar annihilates the column of revenants and slams into the rift itself in a brilliant explosion of infernal red light.    
  
The air fills with a deluge of smouldering, sparking remains- ashes, embers, scrap metal, and the shattered, burning husks of revenant soldiers. Enemy corpses rain through the air, slamming to rest in snowdrifts, onto rooftops and raised shields.    
  
Through the fire, through the smoke and the chaos of battle, through the burning corpses raining through the sky…   
  
Sola and Hamir march, unfazed, through the maelstrom, shining crimson and gold.   
  
~*~   
  
Everywhere, the dead smile at her.    
  
Elsewhere in what was quickly becoming Larksnettle village’s funeral pyre, the young apothecary scurries from cover to cover, searching for somewhere to run, somewhere to hide. But the air flickers and strobes with surreal violet firelight, a wicked parody of natural flame. Black smoke fills the air, and in the smoke, she sees the dead- rictus grins, smiling from every window, every doorway, teeth bared and glinting in the violet light.    
  
She runs, clutching Mother’s guidebook to her chest, flinching at every familiar face she sees strewn across the bloody snow. The smoke stings her eyes, blurring her vision- not that she can even recognize her village in the middle of this catastrophe, not that there’s anything to see through the smoke and the flames…   
  
She hears the pop and crack of breaking timbers. Beside her, a burning cottage roof collapses, kicking up a storm of violet embers.    
  
A smile waits for her around the next corner. A revenant soldier in its grinning, skull-faced helm and a voice like striking flint. His rusty axe flashes in the light-   
  
A whistle. A bang. A dense, wet impact.    
  
The revenant crunches face-first into the snow, an arrow planted in the back of its neck.    
  
She glances at the arrow for a brief moment, before darting into cover behind an old tool shed. She clutches Mother’s guidebook and fights down her panic, her heart hammering in her chest. She hears two more shrieking whistles, two more sharp bites of metal into metal, two more thuds of dead weight hitting the ground.    
  
She presses her back against the side of the shed, swallowing hard. Curiosity and fear war for control of her limbs. Finally, she risks a peek around the corner.    
  
There is a shadow in the alley, a hooded, cloaked figure in a furred mantle and a spent quiver strapped across their back. They pause above the body of a revenant soldier, examining the kill. It’s reaching down to reclaim its arrows when the girl catches a flash of its eyes.    
  
“Hey!” it rasps.    
  
She sees it raise the knife, and she takes off running. She hears the whistle as it cuts through the air. She feels death coming, mere inches away.    
  
The young apothecary darts out of range as the hunter’s knife hits its mark. A fourth revenant soldier reels, reaches for the dagger in its chest, then topples over.    
  
The hooded figure runs up and watches the girl flee, wrenching her knife out of the revenant’s chest. She tugs down the mask over her nose and mouth.    
  
“Hey!” Piper calls after the girl, her voice coarse from all the smoke. “Hey, we’ve got a live one!”   
  
~*~   
  
The Order task force does not stop its assault on the account of a single shadow flitting through the smoke. They cut a bloody, burning swath through the streets of Larksnettle, marching with grim purpose towards the star of omen at its heart.    
  
Sergeant Bryn leads the charge. Her spear is a flame in her hands, shining gold. She chops the blade down in whirling, scything strikes, opening torsos, severing limbs, the sanctified blade shearing through the revenants’ rusting armor as if it were made of paper.    
  
The rift pulses above, weeping black smoke. A shrill keening, like a cruel winter wind, issues forth from the breach. As if in answer, the tide of revenants surges forward with renewed strength. The seething mass of rusted armor and violet ghost lights crashes against the Knights’ phalanx, hissing, chittering, in that unearthly tongue. Freya’s orders cut through the din, her voice as clean and sharp as a blade.    
  
“Sisters, seal the breach! Knights, hold this line!” Freya shouts, sword held high. “ _ Ave illuminae! _ ”   
  
“ _ Ave illuminae! _ ”   
  
A short span away, Sister Ashe stands before the rift in Larksnettle town square. She has one hand clasped against the Order crest around her neck; the other, she raises in blessing. Arrayed around her, four other sisters do the same. Light glimmers at their fingertips.    
  
Power explodes from beneath their feet- a column of golden light encasing the rift, its walls conjured between the hands of the Sisters below. The pillar shines and begins to shrink, crushing the rift in its grasp. The rift pulses and strains against its bonds. Plumes of black smoke shoot out of the rift and pound against the confines of the barrier. The air fills with shrieking metal and squealing, wet glass.    
  
There’s an ominous creaking in the air. A shudder passes through the revenant horde, hesitating in the face of destruction. Then, there’s a thunderous crunch, and the rift is abruptly a fraction of its size. The revenants redouble their efforts, swarming over the phalanx like ants, their sudden panic and desperation as thick as smoke.    
  
Hamir stands before the circle of Sisters, leaning heavily on his staff. Above, the rift strains and thrashes in its death throes; below, its servants clamor to save it. And here he was, anxiously watching the tide crash against the phalanx, just trying to catch his breath.    
  
Hamir’s staff has grown dull, the orb of flame at its headpiece feeble and flickering. He exhales, clutching his quiet reminder to pace himself next time.    
  
“It won’t be long, now,” comes a voice.    
  
Freya strides over, her midnight-blue mantle flaring in the wind. Hamir stands ramrod straight, his staff in the crook of his arm.    
  
“Captain,” he says, bowing his head.    
  
“Ghost,” Freya nods. “Where is your ward?”   
  
There is a blaze of scarlet light in the distance, and one prong of the revenants’ assault is scattered in a furious explosion. Hamir offers a weak smile and tips his head towards the blast. Freya’s lips curl upwards in the faintest trace of a smile.    
  
“Don’t tell me you’re spent already,” Freya says.    
  
Hamir looks sheepish. “...Of- Of course not, Captain.”   
  
Freya simply shakes her head. Her piercing, frosty gaze sweeps across Hamir, lingering on the red pennant of censure below the headpiece of his staff. She lifts her sword, the blade like a bolt of frozen lightning in her grasp, and touches the shining white edge to the crest atop Hamir’s staff.    
  
The orb of flame surges to life. Hamir shivers as a measure of the Goddess’ blessing surges through his limbs. He raises a hand, golden light glinting off his rings and gathering at his fingertips.    
  
Freya nods, curt, before turning to face the enemy. She hefts her shield, as the first revenants squeeze through a gap in the defenses and start rushing towards the Sisters’ ritual. Freya stands tall, Hamir beside her, the pillar strangling the rift defended by a phalanx of two.    
  
“Faith unfailing,” Freya cries out. “ _ Ave illuminae! _ ”   
  
~*~   
  
Piper runs through the burning village, tugging Sola along by the hand. She ducks behind a cabin and pulls Sola into cover with her, peering out at the chaos around them.    
  
“You’re sure?” Sola asks, peeking out above the shorter girl.    
  
“Sure I’m sure!” Piper insists. She frowns, scanning their surroundings.    
  
The mark on Sola’s hand briefly glows like hot coals. She reflexively claps a hand over her Brand, her gaze drawn to the rift over town square and the frenzied fighting in the distance.    
  
“Hamir,” Sola murmurs anxiously.    
  
“There!” Piper points.    
  
Sola sees her- a survivor, half-tripping over her long, dark robes, pursued by a pair of revenant soldiers. Piper’s eager to get moving, but Sola stops her with a hand on her shoulder.    
  
“Get back to the square and defend the Sisters,” Sola says. “I’ll handle this.”   
  
~*~   
  
She runs, her pack jostling against her leg with every step. She can hear the scraping metal voices of the revenants behind her, can feel the deathly chill of their unearthly violet fire creeping closer. She throws a door open and darts into a cottage, diving out a window into an adjoining lane.    
  
Her pursuers are just a moment behind, but she, at last, has a moment to spare. She lays her pack on a snowdrift, rifling through cracked, leaking vials.    
  
Knowledge cuts through the fear. She chooses her vials- tree sap, seed oil, a certain volatile extract- and pours them all into a single bottle. The mixture, clear and viscous, shimmers in the firelight.    
  
Undead hands slam open the cottage door, and the two revenants take their first steps onto the street.    
  
She stoppers the vial, shakes it, and hurls it through the air.    
  
It shatters against a revenant’s faceplate, dousing it in the thick, oozing substance. An instant later, fire erupts across its form. It thrashes and flails, running blind, shrieking in its inhuman voice a sound like sharpening knives.    
  
She doesn’t have time to savor it. The second revenant smashes its immolated companion aside and grabs her by the wrist. She draws her field knife from her belt and stabs, but the blade skitters and scrapes uselessly against the revenant’s armor.    
  
She swears, squirming in the revenant’s grip, searching for a soft spot. The hunter from earlier made it seem so easy! She grits her teeth, struggling, trying to angle her blade around. The revenant’s skull mask glares at her, violet flames in its empty eyes.    
  
She plunges her dagger into a glowing eye-slit.    
  
A gout of violet flame flashes blasts her back and she screams, her hand trailing wisps of violet fire. A skein of magicked frost blooms across her knife-hand and she whimpers, wrapping her frostbitten hand in the folds of her cloak.    
  
She pushes herself up to one knee, hugging her hand to her chest. The revenant looms above her, unfazed by the blade transfixing its skull. It chitters in that strange, metallic language, plucking the dagger out of its head.    
  
She sees it raise the knife-   
  
The revenant shudders and goes stiff, trembling. Lights gather beneath the surface of its armor, glowing like magma within the rusted shell. For a moment, the violet light of undeath in its eyes is replaced by a volcanic scarlet- and then the revenant burns, consumed by a sudden conflagration that reduces it to ash in a heartbeat.    
  
And there, standing in its wake, is a girl. A woman with skin the color of fresh clay, and vivid amber eyes that hold just a touch of crimson. The dark curls of her hair gleam strangely in the firelight, looking almost white before fading to black, the only trace of this lingering in the edges, which gleam like lit coals.    
  
More striking than anything, however, is her smile. Warm. Welcoming. Hers is the first friendly face that she’s seen all day.    
  
“Are you alright?” asks the girl all in red, offering her hand.    
  
The young apothecary gazes at the girl’s calloused fingers, scarred by whatever power she wields that can set even daemons ablaze. She takes the girl’s hand, and lets her lift her to her feet.    
  
“I’m Sola,” the other girl says. “I’m, er, we’re here to help.”   
  
There is a bang, like a thunderclap, and a shockwave races past, ruffling their cloaks and sending embers dancing into the air. She stumbles, but Sola braces her arm and holds her steady.    
  
In the distance, the rift above the town square has vanished, leaving only a warm glow hanging above the village. The soft, golden light settles in the curls of Sola’s hair.    
  
“Are you alright?” Sola echoes, haloed with light.    
  
Their eyes meet- warm amber and pale gray. The apothecary belatedly realizes a number of things. The stabbing, icy pain in her injured hand. The crest, in the shape of a flame, pinned to Sola’s cloak, glinting in a color that matches Sola’s eyes.    
  
The girl realizes that she’s staring, and she looks away, stammering out an apology. Sola, for her part, only smiles.    
  
“What’s your name?” Sola asks.    
  
There’s something magical in those amber eyes. She smiles back, despite everything.    
  
“Luna,” she replies.    
  
~*~


End file.
